How to return value from a widget`s function, and pass it to another widget's function in Tkinter, Python

Question

I am creating a simple GUI including two buttons. First button is for selecting a video file, and the second button gets the video file path and then play it (using OpenCV).

The problem is that I cannot return the file path from the first button binding function and pass it into the second button binding function.

I defined "filename" as a Global Variable, but still "filename" is not defined in the "PlayVideo()" function.

Following is my code:

from tkinter import *
from tkinter import filedialog
from tkinter import messagebox

global filename


def OpenFile():
    filename =  filedialog.askopenfilename(title = "Select file",filetypes = ( ("MP4 files","*.mp4"), ("WMV files","*.wmv"), ("AVI files","*.avi") ))
    print(filename)


def PlayVideo():
    try:
        import cv2

        cap = cv2.VideoCapture(filename)

        while(cap.isOpened()):

            ret, frame = cap.read()

            cv2.imshow('frame', frame)

            if cv2.waitKey(25) & 0xFF == ord('q'):
                break
        cap.release()
        cv2.destroyAllWindows()

    except:
        messagebox.showinfo(title='Video file not found', message='Please select a video file.')


root = Tk()

selectButton = Button(root, text = 'Select video file', command=OpenFile)
playButton = Button(root, text = 'Play', command=PlayVideo)

selectButton.grid(row=0)
playButton.grid(row=1)

root.mainloop()   

When I select a video file, its path is printed. But. when I click the Play button, the error message (Please select a video file) is shown.

Answer 1

You need to add this line at the start of both functions OpenFile and PlayVideo

global filename

When you add this line, your program knows that instead of creating/using a local variable "filename" in that function, it has to use the global variable "filename".

UPDATE:

To avoid using global variables, you can use mutable type like this.

from tkinter import *
from tkinter import filedialog
from tkinter import messagebox

def OpenFile(file_record):
    file_record['video1'] =  filedialog.askopenfilename(title = "Select file",filetypes = ( ("MP4 files","*.mp4"), ("WMV files","*.wmv"), ("AVI files","*.avi") ))
    print(file_record['video1'])

def PlayVideo(file_record):

    try:
        import cv2
        cap = cv2.VideoCapture(file_record['video1'])

        while(cap.isOpened()):
            ret, frame = cap.read()
            cv2.imshow('frame', frame)
            if cv2.waitKey(25) & 0xFF == ord('q'):
                break

        cap.release()
        cv2.destroyAllWindows()

    except:
        messagebox.showinfo(title='Video file not found', message='Please select a video file.')


root = Tk()
filename_record = {}
selectButton = Button(root, text = 'Select video file', command=lambda: OpenFile(filename_record))
playButton = Button(root, text = 'Play', command=lambda: PlayVideo(filename_record))

selectButton.grid(row=0)
playButton.grid(row=2)

root.mainloop()